Pennsylvania license suspensions for DUI charges

College students and others in the area of Indiana, Pennsylvania, rely on their vehicles to get them to class, work and other places where they need to go.

When one thinks about it, if he or she could not drive legally, getting on with life could quickly get quite difficult. Yet, this is exactly the challenge people who have been accused of DUI, possibly even if it is a first-time offense, will face.

In other words, Pennsylvania law, in addition to other penalties, requires license suspensions in most DUI cases. The only exception is for first-time offenders who had a blood alcohol content, or BAC, of just over the .08 legal limit, that is, not equal to or greater than .10 BAC. However, these people will still have to take a mandatory course on the dangers of driving while intoxicated.

For almost all other offenses, a person will receive a license suspension of at least one year. In some cases, the minimum suspension will be 18 months. Generally speaking, the length of the suspension will depend on how many prior drunk driving convictions a person has and on how high his or her BAC was at the time of the incident.

Additionally, those with prior convictions will, after their suspension is served, have to spend 1 year driving with an inconvenient, and expensive, ignition interlock device installed on their vehicles.

Although Pennsylvanians will obviously want to avoid jail time, a license suspension can sometimes seem almost as bad, particularly when not being able to drive means a Pennsylvania resident won’t be able to make ends meet. Fortunately, there are legal options available to those in this situation, even if it is the case that they made a one-time bad decision.